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First trailer for Grand Theft Auto V released

The first trailer for Grand Theft Auto V has been posted on Rockstar Games' …

The first trailer for Grand Theft Auto V was released today by Rockstar Games on the company's website. No release date was announced, but we now know the game stars a character who regresses into a life of crime after attempting to retire.

The new installment in the GTA franchise was announced only last week via a banner on Rockstar's website. The new trailer has shots of buildings and signs that suggest it takes place in the state of San Andreas, with cities including the Los Angeles-esque Los Santos, a city based on San Francisco called San Fierro, and a city based on Las Vegas called Las Venturas. One of the final shots in the trailer is of a Hollywood-style sign that reads Vinewood, and an earlier shot shows characters hiking at the foot of a mountain range.

In the voiceover, the narrators says he "wanted to retire" from "that line of work" and speaks of being a father, putting his feet up and raising children. But a regression into a life of crime is (apparently) inevitable.

The trailer is embedded below for your viewing pleasure.

Grand Theft Auto V Trailer

Casey Johnston
Casey Johnston is the former Culture Editor at Ars Technica, and now does the occasional freelance story. She graduated from Columbia University with a degree in Applied Physics. Twitter@caseyjohnston

The shots of airplanes suggest this is gonna have another very large map. Oh man, I can't wait to tumble down an entire mountain with the Euphoria Engine. Worth the price of admittance by itself, I'd say.

How about the scenes showing small jets flying overhead. Seems to be a hint that the map will be much bigger (a-la San Andreas, like stated in the article) and will probably bring back the many types of aircraft that GTA IV was missing!

Huh? I don't see anything in the trailer that looks like Vegas or San Francisco. Los Santos (LA) is back (you can see "East Los Santos" on a freeway sign behind the panhandler), but it seems like that's the only city. It probably has some backcountry areas (the wind turbines and Yosemite-looking scenery), but this seems like a one-city affair.

Disappointed its in the US again. So many awesome potential locations in the rest of the world. Could be in Sao Paulo, London, Tokyo, St. Petersburg, Mexico City. Somewhere in India or China could be crazy interesting and unique.

Disappointed its in the US again. So many awesome potential locations in the rest of the world. Could be in Sao Paulo, London, Tokyo, St. Petersburg, Mexico City. Somewhere in India or China could be crazy interesting and unique.

Aside from GTA: London, the entire series has been focused on humorously satirizing American culture. It could be incredibly tough to effectively do the same in a foreign country.

Disappointed its in the US again. So many awesome potential locations in the rest of the world. Could be in Sao Paulo, London, Tokyo, St. Petersburg, Mexico City. Somewhere in India or China could be crazy interesting and unique.

Aside from GTA: London, the entire series has been focused on humorously satirizing American culture. It could be incredibly tough to effectively do the same in a foreign country.

While I agree, your argument is probably lost on at least half of the GTA audience. They aren't aware that GTA is satirizing anything. Sadly, they think it's glorifying much of what it's actually making fun of.

Disappointed in that it's not really anything all that new. NYC, LA, they're all the same. Vice City stuck out and was a gem because of it. I don't think they should have done Miami again, but at least do something different.

In fact, that's one of the things that made GTAIV so... eh. There was nowhere to explore. WHy? Every building was 80 stories tall. Sure, there were a few areas with rooftops and underpasses, but a grid-based city with skyscrapers loses a lot of area exploration. Unless, of course, you're Batman.

Rockstar (through Euphoria) seem to be really pushing the bounds of decent animation and IK/physics integration. Almost every movement in the trailer looked like it had the right amount of weight and inertia behind it.

Meh. The last good GTA was Vice City. GTA IV was definitely the wrong direction for me. I guess I'll just stick with Saints Row since I play games like this to have fun. If I want a sim, I'll play a sim (a real sim), not some wannabe half-assed semi-real satire like GTA.

Rockstar (through Euphoria) seem to be really pushing the bounds of decent animation and IK/physics integration. Almost every movement in the trailer looked like it had the right amount of weight and inertia behind it.

Plus, this game looks much more fun and sunny than "standard" GTA IV.

Thumbs up!

By GTAV's release, we'll be looking at 4 years since GTAIV. Does that really look like 4 years of progress to you? To be honest, even when GTAIV came out it didn't look all that great. It wasn't bad, either. And LA Noire spent all that money on facial movements, and the characters looked like convulsive epileptics.

I"m very disappointed with consoles this cycle. They were good when they came out, now they don't come anywhere CLOSE to PC- and PC prices are going down big time.

I guess PCs have always been ahead of consoles, but it's getting ridiculous. The Euphoria engine is looking very dated.

Looks great. While most people thought Vice City was the pinnacle of the series, I absolutely loved San Andreas - the voice acting, the varied landscapes, the territory take-over, the music. This looks like it will at least have the LA/SF/Vegas groove going on, which is nice to see, and the visuals look spectacular.

For some reason, GTA4 sits on my shelf unplayed. Maybe 20 minutes when I got it, and I haven't fired it back up again. Hope I get around to it by the time this is released. I almost thought that was Niko holding the "will work for food" sign.

Meh. The last good GTA was Vice City. GTA IV was definitely the wrong direction for me. I guess I'll just stick with Saints Row since I play games like this to have fun. If I want a sim, I'll play a sim (a real sim), not some wannabe half-assed semi-real satire like GTA.

I agree. I like the GTA franchise but got tired of the friendship, romance, food, and fitness meters. I hope they scale that stuff back.

I think the main character in this game may be the same from GTA3 only now much later into his life. Rockstar could do a " just when I think I'm out, they pull me back in " kind of story and also fill in what has happened with him since we saw him in the car race vs. CJ in the San Andreas game.